The
ad on the left [2]
illustrates the virtues of the Shockley diode when compared to the more
common transistors of the day.Note
that William Shockley is specifically mentioned in the ad text, as personally
in charge of the engineering staff.The photo above is a section of a 4 layer diode “Information Sheet” [3]
which would have been very helpful in explaining this unusual technology to
potential customers.It is
interesting to note that the circuit symbol proposed for the diode was
developed as a modified numeral “4” – in fact, some of the early Shockley
diodes have the number “4” stamped on top of the case.